# If radical Islam is violent due to culture and not religion **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 11, 2015, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741 "2015-09-11T23:24:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 33
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/642 "2015-09-21T23:18:42Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Nobody could respectably claim that the horrors perpetrated in the 30s and 40s were due to “German culture” and not Nazism. That Nazism were an innocent bystander. > > Yet, with Islam-majority nations where oppressive and inhumane practices abound, we blame “culture” and not the ideology. > > Why do we blame ideology in one instance and “culture” in the other? Probably because Naziism existed for a few decades and was uniformly associated with genocide. Islam has existed for over a millenium and has had intermittent associations with violence, as has Christianity; and both also have had intermittent associations with mostly peaceful socities. Do you blame culture (and other factors) for the incredible brutality of many past Christian societies, or is it religious ideology? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/643 "2015-09-22T00:05:59Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Nobody could respectably claim that the horrors perpetrated in the 30s and 40s were due to “German culture” and not Nazism. That Nazism were an innocent bystander. > > Yet, with Islam-majority nations where oppressive and inhumane practices abound, we blame “culture” and not the ideology. > > Why do we blame ideology in one instance and “culture” in the other? > > Is evil done in the name of Islam different than evil done in the name of Nazism? > > Is it different solely because there are many good Muslims? Weren’t there good Nazis as well? I see you have joined Robert163 in the false claim that opponents of Islamophobia insist that religion plays no role in the situation. As long as you insist on a straw man that has no basis in reality, your arguments fail on facts. ETA: I will also note that Christianity played a role in the actions associated with the Holocaust. It was not the driving force, but it established a view of Jews as _Untermenschen_ that allowed much Nazi propaganda to be accepted by the German people. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/644 "2015-09-22T00:15:21Z")
The Nazi Party was not Germany’s religion in the 1930’s and 1940’s. Nazi Germany was a Christian nation. By the logic expressed in this thread, Christianity is to blame for the Holocaust and the War. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/645 "2015-09-22T00:23:25Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I’m arguing that the Bible and the Koran are equally easy to use to justify violence, and equally easy to use to justify peaceful behavior, and I think that this is borne out by history. This statement bugs me. It reminds me of things like “oh, democrats and republicans are all the same”. The Koran has some level of easiness-to-use-in-justifying-violence, which comes from the combinations of lots of different parts of the text. The Bible has some level of easiness-to-use-in-justifying-violence, which comes from the combinations of lots of different parts of the text. What possible reason is there to think that they are equal? You could make a pretty good argument (and people have in this thread) that for both of them, there is both a non-zero collection-of-stuff-that-justifies-violence and a non-zero collection-of-stuff-that-argues-against-violence, but then just saying “ok, well, yup, they’re the same” is just facile and groundless. I think the really tough hurdle is the next step, where one might argue that there’s a strong and immediate and inevitable correlation between the text of the holy book and the actual behavior of the society, which I think is easily disproven by the number of different societies there have been that profess to follow each religion both at present and throughout history. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/646 "2015-09-22T00:41:37Z")
Exactly: even if it were 100% proven that the Koran was a violent book and the Bible a peaceful book…would you rather have as a neighbor a bad Christian, who ignores the peaceful verses, or a bad Muslim who ignores the violent verses? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/647 "2015-09-22T01:18:58Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > This statement bugs me. It reminds me of things like “oh, democrats and republicans are all the same”. The Koran has some level of easiness-to-use-in-justifying-violence, which comes from the combinations of lots of different parts of the text. The Bible has some level of easiness-to-use-in-justifying-violence, which comes from the combinations of lots of different parts of the text. > > What possible reason is there to think that they are equal? You could make a pretty good argument (and people have in this thread) that for both of them, there is both a non-zero collection-of-stuff-that-justifies-violence and a non-zero collection-of-stuff-that-argues-against-violence, but then just saying “ok, well, yup, they’re the same” is just facile and groundless. > > I think the really tough hurdle is the next step, where one might argue that there’s a strong and immediate and inevitable correlation between the text of the holy book and the actual behavior of the society, which I think is easily disproven by the number of different societies there have been that profess to follow each religion both at present and throughout history. Maybe they’re not exactly the same, though I wouldn’t know how to measure it. But from my reading of both, and from my hearing from critics and defenders of both, they seem pretty close to me… Close enough that anyone who wants to find some dubious justification for a violent act in either can probably find it. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/648 "2015-09-22T02:01:22Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > …It’s just totally apples to apples. Kind of “road apples” you see at the Kentucky Derby. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/649 "2015-09-22T14:03:11Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Why are you limiting it to modern times? Surely, if Islam is inherently more violent than other religions, then we can compare Islam to other religions at any point in history, and Islamic cultures will always be more violent. > > Right? Why does that matter, at all? I’m concerned about the way the violence is happening in current events, right now. Why would anyone give 2 shits about something that happened ages ago? In fact, if it helps to lump them all together, I’m good with that. Religions suck, all of them, they promote violence and they should all be looked at a detrimental. Even Islam. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/650 "2015-09-22T14:10:12Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > Why does that matter, at all? I’m concerned about the way the violence is happening in current events, right now. Why would anyone give 2 shits about something that happened ages ago? in practical terms, you’re absolutely right. But the premise of the discussion is that Islam is _inherently_ (and indeed _uniquely_) violent. That would certainly suggest that its entire history is relevant. ---
**Author:** ![A\_isha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@A\_isha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_isha)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/651 "2015-09-22T14:31:45Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Well, before (Muslim) Syria moved into Lebanon, the Christian militias of Lebanon carried out several massacres of Muslims. And made use of suicide bombers, too. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/652 "2015-09-22T14:38:44Z")
> [@andros](#): > > in practical terms, you’re absolutely right. > > But the premise of the discussion is that Islam is _inherently_ (and indeed _uniquely_) violent. That would certainly suggest that its entire history is relevant. If that is the discussion, you are certainly correct that the history of both need to be evaluated but the actual OP just calls out the violence inherent in Islam, today. And there is no question that the majority of violence is happening, today, right now, at the behest of Islam. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/653 "2015-09-22T15:21:56Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > And there is no question that the majority of violence is happening, today, right now, at the behest of Islam. :dubious: The figure bandied about earlier was 8,886 deaths attributable to Islamists worldwide in 2011. The U.S. alone had 14,612 murders that year. The majority of violence is assuredly _not_ “at the behest of Islam”. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/654 "2015-09-22T15:27:43Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > The Nazi Party was not Germany’s religion in the 1930’s and 1940’s. > > Nazi Germany was a Christian nation. > > By the logic expressed in this thread, Christianity is to blame for the Holocaust and the War. This is factually incorrect. The Nazi part of Germany was not christian in any sense. They believed in a pre-christian view of Germans as a race, seperate and unique amongst other peoples. They based their genoicidal actions on what they believed to be the best science of the day (genetics/eugenics). Since Luther there has been a distinct seperation of church and state. Also, the major opposition to Naziism came from christians like the White Rose Movement. ---
**Author:** ![A\_isha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@A\_isha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_isha)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/655 "2015-09-22T15:43:02Z")
> [@madsircool](#): > > This is factually incorrect. > > The Nazi part of Germany was not christian in any sense. They believed in a pre-christian view of Germans as a race, seperate and unique amongst other peoples. They based their genoicidal actions on what they believed to be the best science of the day (genetics/eugenics). Since Luther there has been a distinct seperation of church and state. > > Also, the major opposition to Naziism came from christians like the White Rose Movement. [The German Churches and the Nazi State](http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005206) > [@](#): > > How did Christians and their churches in Germany respond to the Nazi regime and its laws, particularly to the persecution of the Jews? The racialized anti-Jewish Nazi ideology converged with antisemitism that was historically widespread throughout Europe at the time and had deep roots in Christian history. For all too many Christians, traditional interpretations of religious scriptures seemed to support these prejudices. > > […] > > These were some of the reasons why most Christians in Germany welcomed the rise of Nazism in 1933. They were also persuaded by the statement on “positive Christianity” in Article 24 of the 1920 Nazi Party Platform, which read: > > _“We demand the freedom of all religious confessions in the state, insofar as they do not jeopardize the state’s existence or conflict with the manners and moral sentiments of the Germanic race. The Party as such upholds the point of view of a positive Christianity without tying itself confessionally to any one confession. It combats the Jewish-materialistic spirit at home and abroad and is convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only be achieved from within on the basis of the common good before individual good.”_ > > Despite the open antisemitism of this statement and its linkage between confessional “freedom” and a nationalistic, racialized understanding of morality, many Christians in Germany at the time read this as an affirmation of Christian values. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/656 "2015-09-22T15:48:40Z")
> [@A\_isha](#): > > [The German Churches and the Nazi State](http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005206) How bout actually saying something instead of posting some text that addresses nothing that I posted? Economics and political instability are the so-called reasons for what you posted. Almost no German in 1920 or 1933 supported violence against other Germans. ---
**Author:** ![A\_isha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@A\_isha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_isha)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/657 "2015-09-22T15:54:46Z")
> [@madsircool](#): > > How bout actually saying something instead of posting some text that addresses nothing that I posted? It addressed exactly what you posted, the false claim that “the Nazi part of Germany was not christian in any sense”. It was _very_ Christian, starting with the long history of Christian antisemitism in Europe. > [@](#): > > Economics and political instability are the so-called reasons for what you posted. Almost no German in 1920 or 1933 supported violence against other Germans. Of _course_ they did. Germany was rife with violence being done by Germans to other Germans, including a large amount of support for violence being done to German Jews. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/658 "2015-09-22T16:08:18Z")
> [@A\_isha](#): > > It addressed exactly what you posted, the false claim that “the Nazi part of Germany was not christian in any sense”. It was _very_ Christian, starting with the long history of Christian antisemitism in Europe. > > Of _course_ they did. Germany was rife with violence being done by Germans to other Germans, including a large amount of support for violence being done to German Jews. The Nazi Party had almost zero links to christianity or any other religion. It was biologically nationalistic which is contrary to anything religion preaches. No leading Nazis were religious. Please post some links to anything Hitler wrote or said that would suggest that Nazi Germany was infkuenced ideologically by christianity. Further, in Europe Jews could always save themselves by converting. In Germany Judiasm was seen as genetic, not religious. Your genes condemned you and there was no escape. Your attempt to link christianity to naziism is a fail. You are correct that there was a lot of political violence in Germany, I should have been clearer. What I meant to say is that virtually no German, nazi or otherwise, would have supported the Holocaust. Please note that it was carried out under the fog of war and outside of Germany,hidden away in the countryside. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/659 "2015-09-22T16:27:47Z")
BTW…if we wanna take note of a religious figure that was openly pro Nazi take a look at this guy > **[Hajj Amin al-Husayni: Wartime Propagandist](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/hajj-amin-al-husayni-wartime-propagandist)** > > Former Mufti of Jerusalem Hajj Amin al-Husayni was an exiled political leader who sought an alliance with the Axis Powers. Learn about his wartime propaganda efforts. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/660 "2015-09-22T16:31:48Z")
> [@madsircool](#): > > What I meant to say is that virtually no German, nazi or otherwise, would have supported the Holocaust. Please note that it was carried out under the fog of war and outside of Germany,hidden away in the countryside. My understanding is that this has been [proven mostly false](http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2001/feb/17/johnezard). Most Germans were aware of the Holocaust – they knew about the camps (some of which were in Germany), for the most part, and they knew that people (Jews and others) were brought in, and executed and/or worked to death. They also were aware of the mass deportation of Jews eastwards, never to be seen again. And, of course, hundreds of thousands of German soldiers and SS personnel (and others) saw firsthand aspects of the Holocaust in action. In short, it wasn’t particularly hidden to Germans, and Germans at the time were mostly okay with it. ---
**Author:** ![A\_isha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@A\_isha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_isha)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741/661 "2015-09-22T16:34:49Z")
> [@madsircool](#): > > The Nazi Party had almost zero links to christianity or any other religion. It was biologically nationalistic which is contrary to anything religion preaches. No leading Nazis were religious. Please post some links to anything Hitler wrote or said that would suggest that Nazi Germany was infkuenced ideologically by christianity. [http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/08/23/list-of-hitler-quotes-he-was-q/](http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/08/23/list-of-hitler-quotes-he-was-q/) > [@](#): > > Further, in Europe Jews could always save themselves by converting. In Germany Judiasm was seen as genetic, not religious. Your genes condemned you and there was no escape. And the only reason the scientific racism of the Nazis was accepted (and the only reason it was so focused on Jews) was because of the centuries of religious antisemitism that pervaded Europe and particularly Germany. Or do you think that the Nazi obsession with Judaism sprung up _ex nihilo_ in 1933? > [@](#): > > You are correct that there was a lot of political violence in Germany, I should have been clearer. What I meant to say is that virtually no German, nazi or otherwise, would have supported the Holocaust. Please note that it was carried out under the fog of war and outside of Germany,hidden away in the countryside. Really? So who was it that planned and executed the Holocaust, from the attendees at Wannsee to the KZ personnel and the members of the Einsatzgruppen? Magical fairies? > [@](#): > > Your attempt to link christianity to naziism is a fail. If you say so. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741.md?page=32) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-radical-islam-is-violent-due-to-culture-and-not-religion/730741.md?page=34)